So, I was rereading your previous post, "Destination: Unknown," and a few thoughts came to me. Particularly, where the idea of leftists not knowing where to begin with sharing their vision is concerned. It made me think of how we teach the kids at school.
To anyone else who reads this, I am a teacher's assistant at a private school for autistic children. It's an amazing job with lots of laughing and bruises to show for it. Anyway, we have to teach our kids basic skills like eating, brushing their teeth, washing their hands, even just taking off and hanging up their bookbag and coat in the morning. Yeah, my dad said to me, we have to teach you kids all those things. But often us neurotypical kids have the language understanding to learn these skills in preschool. When you are teaching 9, 12, 14 year old boys with autism how to do these things, the dynamic is much different.
So the thing that we try to remember is fostering independence through compassion (though we almost never use the 'c' word among the staff!) We have to make them do things they don't want to do, like leaving their toys, the computer, or whatever, in order to practice tasks like sorting utensils. Then, there are lots of times where we want to do the task for them. In the beginning, we are told to teach the kids with hand-over-hand work. That ensures that the task is complete, we are helping them, but it gets them acquainted with it. Gradually, we fade to less intrusiveness until the kid is independently brushing his own hair or feeding himself. Yay! Sometimes it takes a while, which is why we have to be patient.
I think this approach would be great is replicated on a global level. Instead of throwing money at countries, and instead of telling people they must do things 'our way', we should try to begin with hand-over-hand, but ultimately be working toward their independence. When I speak of this, I am referring to rogue governance in Africa, I am talking about homeless people living in DC, I am thinking about how a body blessed with lots of resources and ability can help another that may be lacking.
2 comments:
It looks awesome...
... but you should stop doodling in your law school classes. ;)
Then again, I guess I can't complain so long as you're not making your professor sing "Row Your Boat" to you for endlessly...
So, I was rereading your previous post, "Destination: Unknown," and a few thoughts came to me. Particularly, where the idea of leftists not knowing where to begin with sharing their vision is concerned. It made me think of how we teach the kids at school.
To anyone else who reads this, I am a teacher's assistant at a private school for autistic children. It's an amazing job with lots of laughing and bruises to show for it. Anyway, we have to teach our kids basic skills like eating, brushing their teeth, washing their hands, even just taking off and hanging up their bookbag and coat in the morning. Yeah, my dad said to me, we have to teach you kids all those things. But often us neurotypical kids have the language understanding to learn these skills in preschool. When you are teaching 9, 12, 14 year old boys with autism how to do these things, the dynamic is much different.
So the thing that we try to remember is fostering independence through compassion (though we almost never use the 'c' word among the staff!) We have to make them do things they don't want to do, like leaving their toys, the computer, or whatever, in order to practice tasks like sorting utensils. Then, there are lots of times where we want to do the task for them. In the beginning, we are told to teach the kids with hand-over-hand work. That ensures that the task is complete, we are helping them, but it gets them acquainted with it. Gradually, we fade to less intrusiveness until the kid is independently brushing his own hair or feeding himself. Yay! Sometimes it takes a while, which is why we have to be patient.
I think this approach would be great is replicated on a global level. Instead of throwing money at countries, and instead of telling people they must do things 'our way', we should try to begin with hand-over-hand, but ultimately be working toward their independence. When I speak of this, I am referring to rogue governance in Africa, I am talking about homeless people living in DC, I am thinking about how a body blessed with lots of resources and ability can help another that may be lacking.
Am I on the right track? Any track?
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